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Miami Vice - the TV series

I just bought season 1 on DVD. It's still pretty cool, but perhaps not yet as edgy as The Shield, for those of you who know FX's show.

Still Miami is really enjoyable and features more babes in swimsuits - you have to love that!

The Ferrari's, speedboats, sea planes, and music give it a lot of style.

I just saw Al Bundy appear in an episode (Ed O'Neil) as an undercover FBI agent.

The show is still intense and for Shield fans, features two bad cops at least (the guys' lieutenient is on the take from the Columbian drug cartel, and Sonny knows it - I'm just approaching the 2-part episode where he and Tubbs probably do something about it. Edward James Olmos joins the show at some point as their new lieutenient and remains there throughout the series).

Unlike the movie, Sonny is having an affair with Gina. Rico hasn't made a move on Trudy yet - and I don't remember if he does. We'll get there.

Star Wars' Jimmy Smits (Bail Organa) was in the series "movie debut" as Sonny's first partner that gets killed by a car bomb in a bad drug deal. It wasn't surprising to see Smits playing a cop

The original might be a lot better than the recent movie - but there are a lot of similar shoot-outs at shipyard wherehouses and speedboat chases.

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The original Vice is one of my favorite shows of all time. It defined the 80's and still holds up today. I'll take it over that pretentious crap with Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx any day. Don Johnson will always be Sonny Crocket and PMT will always be Ricardo Tubbs. Of course, it would not be Vice without Edward James Olmos as Castillo (Bushido is my favorite ep). It had great atmosphere and style and you can't deny that Jan Hammer contributed so much to the success of Vice. Plus, Crocket's Daytona and Testarossa were the coolest cars ever. I just wish they'd hurry and release the other seasons on DVD. Season 3 was my fav.

I just watched the 2-parter where they took speedboats to the Bahamas to track down Calderone and Rico fell in love with his daughter, but she witnessed Sonny shooting him dead and full of holes from an automatic submachine gun.

(Season 1 - I'll buy No. 2 when I finish watching these).

I've heard no word on when they're coming out with Season 3. But I totally agree - I'd much rather have these shows than a collection of movies with Farrel and Foxx. However, the movie did parallel the TV series very well - with about the only difference being that Rico makes the kill shots in the movie, whereas in the episode I just watched, Sonny took care of the nasty business.

And yeah, I love those Jan Hammer tunes - and remember their informant "Izzy." LOL - who can forget that guy?

Anyway, I think the show went 5 years. '84 to '89 I think. I definitely want to collect all the seasons.

The actress that played Gina was hot (Sandra Santiago).

BTW: the seasons have so far been released 10 months apart. We should be due for Season 3 any time now - still no word on BestBuy's site or Wal-Mart's.

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I just watched an awesome episode guest starring Bruce Willis as an arms dealer trying to unload Stinger missles that terrorists could use to bring down planes.

Rico goes undercover as his buyer while Sonny struggles to not interfere while the guy terribly abuses his wife.

In the end it's revealed that the Federal government uses him to deliver weapons into the hands of Central and South American forces opposed to left-wing regimes or revolutionaries and the CIA plans to have him freed - however his tortured wife has other plans.

That was a darn good episode! They really knew how to write for this show sometimes.

Edward James Olmos is funny installed as Lt. Castillo now (Rico and Sonny's boss). It's funny, as he acts with his eery silence versus a lot of expositionary dialogue.

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Well, Gina just had to f-k an ugly, hairy chested, balding on top, fat guy who was the pimp behind an escort service. She compromised herself so she didn't blow her cover. She ended up blowing him away though - with her handgun - though we don't really know however else she might have covered that.

Sad but cliche nowadays - what happens to undercover female cops during prostitution sting operations. The worse case scenerio there could be often turns up as a plot device in TV cop shows. It certainly did on The Shield.

Incidently, The Shield is a much better show in so far as the caliber of the acting (by the guest stars - the main characters on both shows are all very talented) but Miami features some exotic locales and very fancy homes and luxury vehicle toys. The Shield is set in (what to me) is a very familiar and gritty side of Los Angeles.

It's not entirely an apples-oranges comparison, but that can be looked at two different ways.

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You have to remember, Tycho, that this show is 20 years old. The standards have changed dramatically since then. The Shield has an MA rating and they can use profanity and nudity and portray a much more grittier realism than Vice could on prime-time network television. Still, Vice was pretty gritty for its day.

Oh, and that bald, hairy chested man Gina had to sleep with was Burt Young a.k.a. Paulie, yo!

Dave, I'm all too aware of the different ratings standards that The Shield can get away with because it's on a cable channel. I think that even if it weren't 20 years ago, Miami Vice would still have to be somewhat tame if it were on network television now, today.

Back in the day, I was a kid when that show came on (arond 10 years old) and my mom didn't want me watching it and likely asking "why is Gina going upstairs with that dirty, old man?" - that sort of thing. I'm sure The Shield would not have won any points with her.

Why do we protect kids from seeing or knowing about that stuff? I think they can grow up able to better cope with the world if they're exposed to it. And it helps if it has a good soundtrack

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Castillo is emerging as a great character in the two-part episode I just watched (Golden Triangle) in which we learn that he was a DEA agent operating in Southeast Asia and married a girl while he was stationed there. He was sold out by US CIA though and barely escaped with his life. He thought his wife was killed in a hit as well. He left Thailand then. The US was patronizing Thai drug lords to hold on to stability in the region after Vietnam, etc. Castillo was doing his job by the book.

Well his wife wasn't killed but believed he had been or he abandoned her because she was easy to leave behind, not being American. She married another man and had a child with him. Wow! Talk about finding out some shockers over 5 years later!

Anyway, when a Thai drug lord tries to set up shop in Miami, he uses the threat of bieng able to kill Castillo's estranged wife as a means to try and control the police action against him in Miami, but the Vice Squad team help their lieutenient save the day in the end.

There's a really nice Lamborghini in this one!

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